Too Much of Heaven
by Andromache
Summary: The Story of Elizabeth Coronado, Umbrella's prodigy
1. Default Chapter Title

Too Much of Heaven  
EXTREMELY revised.  
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of Resident Evil but wish that I did. I could use the money. I do however own the character of Elizabeth Coronado. She is all that I have. Please do not sue me.   
  
Watch a man in times... of adversity to discover what kind of man he is; for then at last words of truth are drawn from the depths of his heart, and the mask is torn off....  
-Lucretius  
De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things)  
died 55 b.c.  
  
The prodigy lay on her bed, curled in a fetal position. She wept softly, knowing what she was and hating herself for it. Although it was not her doing officially, she blamed herself for the deaths of the citizens of Raccoon City. She worked for Umbrella, and in some way, it was her fault. She was one of the head scientists of the bioweapon department and had ordered William Birkin's death herself so she could evaluate the G-Virus in person. She approved the decision to create the Tyrant series of experiments in a committee meeting by abstaining from the vote altogether. She believed that good men that stood idle when evil was done were just as evil as the men that committed the act. Thus, she condemned herself.   
  
She did not have much time to pity herself when one of the members of the S.T.A.R.S. team burst through her door. She barely stirred as he ordered her to give her name.   
  
" My name is Elizabeth Coronado. I'm the acting head of Bioweapons, " she murmured softly, fearing that if she spoke louder, he would know that she was crying.   
  
He told her to get up. Elizabeth gathered herself and stood up, her blonde hair disheveled and her glasses askew. She adjusted her glasses and smoothed her rumpled clothes and lab coat.   
  
She whispered, " What is your name? " He sternly replied, " Chris Redfield. " He was tall and in obvious good physical shape. He would have made an excellent specimen to work with in the experiments. No, she could not think that now. Umbrella would soon be gone, and she most likely would be tried for crimes against humanity, Elizabeth thought. She shook her head, attempting to rid herself of such thoughts.   
  
His voice broke through to her. " Follow me. This place has gone to hell, and I have my doubts as to how you survived. Everyone else either committed suicide or been turned into a zombie by the virus."   
  
She said, " I can tell you now, if you want, how I survived. "   
  
He shook his head. " That will have to wait until we're safe, Ms. Coronado. "   
  
Elizabeth meekly followed Chris, the man who discovered her. He walked stiffly in front of her in stony silence obviously still coping with the statement that she had just spoken.   
  
Chris gripped his semi-automatic rifle tightly and pressed his lips into a thin, bloodless line. He walked forcefully through the laboratory level of the facility, shooting whatever zombie had managed to shamble across his path. He grimly mused that there ought to be a superstition about that sort of thing along with the one about black cats. All the while, the realization of what Elizabet really was plagued his thoughts. Was this pale, thin creature that followed him really the crazed mastermind that he had always imagined was behind the debauchery of Umbrella? It was extremely difficult to believe.   
  
He looked over his shoulder at the petite scientist as they waited for the doors of an elevator to open. In the low emergency lights, Elizabeth seemed far too fragile. Her pale skin blended into the dim white walls, and her reddish-brown eyes, though not looking into his own, still pierced outward from her face somewhat unnaturally. Chris was used to the kind of brown eyes that appeared to be friendly and watery at the same time. These eyes were very different from the friendly brown eyes of his grandmother. Chris noticed as well that even in the low lights that the reflection of the lights cast a small halo around her head.  
  
Elizabeth sensed from the lull in Chris' movement that something was amiss. She looked up and met his intense blue eyes with her own. She opened her mouth to ask what was wrong when he averted his gaze, turning to look at the zombified lab assistant that still occupied the elevator.   
  
Chris pulled the trigger on his rifle, firing multiple rounds into the zombie. The former lab assistant jerked and spasmed under the barrage, eventually falling to the ground outside of the elevator at Chris' feet. He let a small, grim smile of satisfaction creep onto his lips.  
  
Elizabeth did not take her eyes from the body of the lab assistant. She used to work with him although it was more appropriate to say that he had worked for her. His rotting form bore only a slight resemblance to the man that she had known. The glassy blank look on his half-decayed face sent chills down her spine. Once again she was faced with product of her own puzzling inner lunacy.  
  
Chris turned to her, still half-smiling, and said, " Come on. I think it's safe to go in now. "  
  
Elizabeth finally removed her eyes from the lab assistant and went into the elevator which was decorated with a marble tile floor and brass-finished walls and ceiling. Chris entered the elevator behind her. He noticed that Elizabeth seemed to withdraw into herself whwnever she could, giving him a difficult time trying to figure out what kind of person she was exactly.   
  
She cast her eyes to the marble floor. Tracing the delicate patterns of black threads on the white background was soothing. It didn't require her to speak to Chris or attempt to apologize for the atrocities that she had brought into the world. It was safe to be in shock. The world couldn't get to her there. Of course, her nervous stomach could and was doing so at the moment. She turned her head sideways, away from the task of tracing the black threads and towards Chris, who was then pressing one of the hard plastic floor buttons so that they could return to ground level. He still held his rifle diagonally across his chest in his right hand. He appeared both fierce and frightening to her, wearing body armor, a dark green short-sleeved shirt that clung to his muscular torso, black fatigue-style pants, and black leather combat boots. Such a contrast to her long white lab coat with long sleeves, slim black pants, long-sleeved brown silk button-down shirt, and black flat shoes. The lab would not allow, according to safety procedures, open-toe shoes or long hair that was not tied back which was why she had clipped her blonde hair back. She thought that she obviously looked weak in comparison to Chris.   
  
Chris was about to ask her what was causing her to withdraw when the elevator shook suddenly. Both former S.T.A.R.S. team member and scientist fell to the elevator's marble floor. Chris fell squarely on his shoulder blades on one of the rear corners of the elevator. His reflexes brought the gun into ready position to fire at the as yet unseen threat. Elizabeth fell halfway on top of Chris, her head pillowed by his left hip and thigh. Her prone position allowed for the perfect view of the denting ceiling.   
  
The ceiling itself was becoming home to an increasing number of dents. Each dent was punctuated by the resounding bass of the impact of the force acting upon the ceiling. Chris and Elizabeth could only watch as the ceiling was ripped away to reveal the monster that had done the deed. The darkness of the elevator shaft obscured their vision, but the monster looked like it was a Tyrant. It focused its gaze first on Elizabeth and then intensified its cold glare at Chris. Then it growled.   
  
" S.T.A.R.S....." 


	2. Default Chapter Title

Too Much of Heaven  
Chapter 2 (Painful revision)  
by Andromache  
  
Disclaimer: I do not own the canonical characters of Resident Evil. Capcom does. I own the character of Elizabeth Coronado. I make no money from writing this story.  
______________________________________________________________________  
  
The intelligible roar of the monster chilled Chris' blood. He had heard stories of it from Jill and Carlos. It had chased them relentlessly through the streets of Raccoon City shortly before the city was turned into a grease spot on the landscape. Another one was now a few moments away from destroying the former S.T.A.R.S. member and the scientist that had engineered its existence.   
  
The Nemesis roared again, but before it could tear into the elevator, Elizabeth cried out, "No! Stop this! I did not make you for this purpose!"  
  
It recoiled from her, and the telltale sign of weight being lifted from the top of the elevator assured Chris that the monster had left. He asked Elizabeth as he lay stunned on the floor of the elevator, her head resting on his left hip, "How did you do that?"  
  
She, equally shocked, replied, "I do not know."  
  
The elevator, although severely damaged by the Nemesis, arrived at the ground floor of the facility and opend its doors. Chris and Elizabeth hastily got up from the floor and exited the elevator and then the facility after walking through the sparse reception area. After another walk, they arrived at what Elizabeth supposed was the base camp for the enemies of Umbrella. Three men, two Caucasian and one of Latin descent, and two women, one red-haired with Chris' striking blue eyes and the other brunette, were already standing there.  
  
Chris greeted them, and when asked, he casually introduced Elizabeth, "This is Doctor Elizabeth Coronado, the acting head of Umbrella."  
  
Elizabeth quickly glanced at Chris. He did not have to tell them that now. She wanted a small chance to meet these people on good terms. That was all lost now.  
  
The group stared at her, some openly angry. She knew that what she had said would not be taken well although she thought that this kind of information had no possibility of being taken well.   
  
" What did you say?" Claire sputtered. " Are you in charge of this sick, sadistic corporation?" she asked incredulously.   
  
Elizabeth answered her, " No, not technically what with the board of directors disappearing as soon as they had confirmation that you were in the country. I am on the committee for biohazardous experiments, and I came up with the original idea for this perticular strain of the virus. They wanted someone to create a better version of the virus than the Ashfords could and whom they could control. " She was starting to feel nauseous, but she had to continue. " I am responsible for all the pain that you have been through within the past year or so, all the deaths of your friends and teammates and of the citizens of Raccoon City."   
  
Elizabneth shook slightly as her knees weakened. " I'm sorry. I really am. "  
  
Carlos appeared to be about to curse at her, but Chris moved his arm across Carlos' chest, preventing him from saying anything. Barry and Jill stood frozen, not quite believing what she had said.   
  
Leon responded angrily, " Do you really expect us to believe you? You destroyed the lives of the citizens of an entire city, and you say that you're sorry? Umbrella definitely had you guys on some serious hallucinogenic drugs if you want forgiveness from us. "  
  
Elizabeth sat down on a power converter terminal that had fed power to her lab. She put her face in her hands, and she wanted to speak but fainted before she could continue.   
  
When Elizabeth awoke some fifteen minutes later, she was laying on the ground in front of the converter, staring at the sky which was rosy and purple with the sunset. The face of Chris Redfield was looking at her, concerned and relieved at the same time. She hardly expected any kindness from anyone, and so the look on Chris' face was certainly a surprise. He aided her to her feet and stood by her until she no longer felt lightheaded.   
  
The others were concentrating on fixing dinner and contacting the authorities and making them believe the wild story that they were told. Chris walked with Elizabeth in silence until they came to the summit of the hill overlooking the facility. She stopped and swallowed, and asked him the question that had plagued her since she awoke. " Do..do you hate me? "   
  
" I don't know what to think, Miss Coronado."   
  
" I mean, now that you know who started it all, does that change your first impression of me? I would understand if you did. "   
  
He thought and slowly replied, " I'm still processing what you told us. On one hand, I want to believe that you are intrinsically a good person and didn't mean to let it go this far, but on the other, coming up with the virus damn near makes you a monster in the S.T.A.R.S. book."   
  
" I thought so. I think that of myself right now. " Elizabeth murmured. She wanted to believe what he said about her, that she was good, but she knew that would be far from the truth.   
  
He walked beside her for a few more steps and then asked the question that he had been wanting to ask since he found her laying on her bed inside the laboratory facility, " How did this start? "   
  
" It's a long story."   
  
" When I graduated from college with a doctorate in bioengineering, a master's degree in microbiology, and a bachelor's degree in biology, I was immediately snapped up by Umbrella. They told me how honored they were to have me, how I was so lucky to have found them at this stage of development in the company. They hit the patriotic part of me when they said that they were working on government projects which was true at that time. The government hadn't withdrawn their funding yet.   
  
"They set me up here. They gave me whatever I wanted in the way of materials, and in return they asked me to create a biological weapon that was inexpensive to create but multiplied quickly and enabled soldiers to be in as little danger as possible when they moved in afterwards to clean up the area. Someone suggested the idea of a virus much like the chemical weapons of previous wars, like mustard gas, only with the capability to be more discreet and faster to take effect. I guess I had seen too many monster movies the night before I came up with the idea of the NE-T-Virus. I wrote my report on what I believed that I could do. The head of bioweapons then approved the idea, and I was given the go-ahead. I theorized that the virus would be most effective if I could induce certain behaviors in the targets of the virus like the need to congregate with other people soon after infection. The higher-ups were pleased because even the Ashfords could not do what I had done."  
  
Chris interjected, " Too many monster movies? Seriously? "  
  
" No, actually. I have a strange sense of humor that shows up at the oddest times.  
  
" However, to continue, I was naive enough to think that I was in control of my own research, but I found that someone was breaking into my files and reading them, occasionally even correcting my mistakes when I was gone for the night. At some point, I don't know when, I started to decline. I agreed to test on subjects when I had a working form of the virus.   
  
" I injected the first lab animal with the virus and stayed overnight to watch the effects take place. The mouse I used moved noticeably more sluggish the next day and had begun to scratch at itself. When I came in that afternoon, the virus was fully at war with the mouse's immune system, and it had a ravenous appetite. It kept trying to claw through the cage to get to the other cage full of mice. The next night, the mouse had chewed through the metal cage and was then working on the cage of the other mice. Soon after, it had infected the other mice. All in all, it took about three days to completely destroy the mice population of the lab. I had a nightmare that night but thought nothing of it.  
  
" Someone from the board of directors wrote me a letter congratulating me on my success, and I felt esctatic. Here, one of the top men in Umbrella had taken an interest in my work. That's when I started to think that I had become so vitally important to them, and I developed a God complex. Nothing was ever wrong with my work, and I had created the most talked about experiment that the company had ever had. I was feeling good about myself.   
  
" I continued the experiments on larger and larger animals until I tested the virus on a Doberman pinscher. The aggressive aspect of the virus didn't really hit until the dog came extremely close to biting me one day. It had been a gentle dog until that point. It was never used for guard duty or even trained for it. I was lucky that I didn't get bitten. The animal was destroyed that evening of course, but my confidence in my own ability was not shaken in the least. I was still the darling of Umbrella, and I was called the prodigy of the biowarfare field. Nothing fazed me."   
  
Chris, silent until now, wide-eyed with the story she was telling, asked, " Even when that dog had its jaws inches from your body, you never questioned the ethics of what you were doing? And you weren't scared at all? "   
  
Elizabeth shook her head. " Never. Every animal is disposable in a lab including humans at a certain point. They even brought in some homeless men that they had lured with the promise of a meal and a bed to test the virus on humans. Umbrella never cared for anything. I know that now, but I would have never listened to that if I had been told then. "   
  
They walked back to the main campsite where the rest of the group waited. Dinner was now ready, and Elizabeth hesitantly ate the meal, fearing that any moment one of them would execute her. Claire, Chris' sister, engaged him in a heated discussion some distance from where Elizabeth ate, gesturing towards her angrily. Chris appeared to be attempting to reason with her and most likely told her that Elizabeth was valuable to their credibility with the government. She didn't care what he told his sister as long as she got to finish her story at some point.   
  
Carlos looked a bit sheepish and sat down next to Elizabeth. Jill followed with Barry and Leon, and they gathered around her.   
  
" So, what's a intelligent girl like you doing in an evil corporation like Umbrella? " Carlos asked playfully.   
  
Skeptical of the jovial greeting, Elizabeth turned her head away and quietly replied, " You wouldn't like me if I told you. Wait, I don't think you liked me anyways. "   
  
Jill spoke," It wouldn't matter now. Umbrella's gone, and Chris filled us in before Claire dragged him off. Some story you have there. Why did you accept the job with Umbrella? I mean, you were fresh out of college. You could have gone to any research facility. Why them?"   
  
Elizabeth paused. Why did she go to Umbrella? She eventually said, " They offered me a lot. A laboratory, all the funding I wanted, all I had to do was work for them. A scientist's dream..."   
______________________________________________________________________  
  
A/N: I am revising each part of this story bit by bit. I admit that I have not paid much attention to it lately...read that as being five months or so. I want to finish the story at some point.  
  
Andromache 


	3. Default Chapter Title

Too Much of Heaven:Chapter Three   
by Andromache  
These characters with the excepton of Miss Coronado belong to Capcom and their associates. Please do not sue me. I have already signed over my soul to my college financial aid office. However the blood of my first born child is still available.  
  
" I went to Umbrella because I could not resist the temptation, " Elizabeth resumed. " They were like the sirens of Greek mythology. They put out propaganda that made them seem like candidates for sainthood, and they gave me what I wanted or thought I wanted. I even talked to some of the scientists that worked for them, and they all said that Umbrella was great to work for. I thought that the scientists all seemed a bit odd, enjoying activities that did not befit a normal scientist's lifestyle like hunting, I think that's what they called it. I learned later that 'hunting' was generally setting the homeless men from the same group that I had experimented out on a certain piece of land and were used as human targets for these scientists. Apparently the board of directors encouraged it openly. I did it once, and it made me sick at first, but later in the 'hunt', it grew on me if only because everyone else was so enthusiastic about it. It made it easier to experiment on those men when it came time to do so."   
  
Backlit by the moon, Barry was not easy to see, so Elizabeth was startled when his silhouette spoke forcefully, " You enjoyed that? What kind of monstrosity are you?"   
  
Realizing that there was not much that she could do to placate him, Elizabeth meekly nodded. It pained her to be seen as a monster. Umbrella had made her into one, and now she had to remake herself into human being again.   
  
"I don't know. I can't really say that it wasn't my fault although there were other scientists working with me. I let myself, with encouragement, destroy the lives of thousands of people. What do you call that other than a monster? I would like to think of myself as good, but even good people can do evil things. "   
  
Carlos leaned to put an arm around her shoulders, and he said in his lovely accent, " Miss Coronado, I can understand only a little of what you have gone through because I worked for Umbrella myself. Jill questioned me about why I worked for them, and a lot of the same reasons came up. They offered me all of my dreams on a silver platter. Why wouldn't I work for them? They gave me everything. Hell, whatever they offered was a step up from living in a third world country. I didn't create the virus like you did, but sometimes I see the same blood on my hands. "   
  
She said quietly, " I guess you might expect me to be different. A lunatic bent on the destruction of the world. You also might forget that there was a human being behind the depravity of this corporation. Remember Medea? She killed her children, and people today glorify her for doing so. She was a mystic but still human. "   
  
Elizabeth stood up from the ground where she had been sitting, walked to the edge of the property line and faced the group. She looked like a ghost in the pale moonlight. Her face was tearstained, glittering streaks marking her cheeks.   
  
" Maybe you guys don't understand that it is possible to be sorry about this kind of situation. I lived in a bubble that Umbrella uniquely created for me.   
  
" Nothing affected me inside it. No one was hurt that wasn't expendable in the view of the corporation. Remember how I said that someone had been messing with my files and altering some of my data? That was one of the directors. They wanted to try the experiment on a larger scale, hence the mansion in Raccoon City. This was before the accidents that led to the newspaper articles," Elizabeth spoke in a voice that was timid but commanding. " I went through my life without realizing the consequences of what I was doing. When you are doing the kind of activity that I was, you don't know that anyone else is affected by you. Everything is so removed from you that you can go about your business without a clue. Normal scientists are like this as well. I never knew what was going on outside of my lab.   
  
" Do you know what I wanted to do? I wanted to create something that by means of it, the world would be restored to some sense of order. It wouldn't have mattered whether or not it won me the Nobel Prize or anything. Bioweapons just generally don't get that kind of recoginition. I just wanted to be something better that this. Do you hear me? This is not what I wanted to do! " she screamed raggedly. Elizabeth's eyes were welling up with tears again, and she ran into the facility. Her lab coat flared as she ran, forming wilted wings behind her.   
  
Leon, who had gone over to Chris and Claire during the conversation, arrived at their location and had heard the last part of Elizabeth's statement. She seemed genuinely upset by what she had done. It was difficult to give her a second chance, yet he found himself wanting to do so.   
  
Jill, silently absorbing what Elizabeth had said, perceived that this woman was neither a monster or a lunatic but a human who has come face to face with the evil in her soul's deepest regions and realized that it has taken over. She was fighting to regain her humanity and would need their help.   
  
Carlos empathized with her. He, too, had worked for Umbrella, and he also had to overcome tremendous obstacles to consider himself good again. What he had done for them paled in comparison to what she started by creating the virus, but still, Elizabeth must be given the chance that he'd had.   
  
Barry could not quite forgive her, so he remained stone-faced. Dr. Coronado was off to a good start, but could she forgive herself as well as have other people forgive her? If he could forgive her, maybe she had a chance at the same thing. There were secrets that she still hid that were too painful to reveal now that would heal her later.  
  
  
  



	4. Default Chapter Title

Too Much of Heaven: Chapter Four by Andromache Save for Miss Coronado, all of the characters form Resident Evil belong to Capcom and their associates. Please don't hurt me. 

During her argument with her brother, Chris, Claire Redfield had not noticed Elizabeth's abrupt departure. Instead, she was furious that he had not killed her when he first saw her. 

" Claire, that's not what S.T.A.R.S. is about. I've told you often enough. We want to stop this kind of activity and then try to salvage what's left of the people who get screwed in the process. 

" Elizabeth is one of those people. We have to help her. She already promised to help us by lending her crediblity when we inform the humanities organizations about Umbrella's activities. Can we do any better than to have the creator of the virus? " Chris said, exasperated by now. They had been arguing for the better part of hour now. 

Claire paused. Her brother had a logical point, but she didn't like having to deal with that woman any more than she had to and said so. 

Chris sighed. He knew how hard it was for his sister to accept Elizabeth as anything other than a madwoman bent on the enslavement of the world. The words of Claire's next statement shook him from his thoughts. 

" Why are you so gung-ho about her anyway? Is there something more than ' We have to save her. It's what we do. ' ? "she asked, suspecting an ulterior motive behind his defense. 

He groaned inwardly. He could admit that when he first saw her, Elizabeth was crying and looked vulnerable. She appeared to him as someone who needed help, not condemnation. Chris also could not deny that she was behaving strangely while she wept on her bed inside the laboratory. He had thought that all of the employees of the Umbrella Corporation did not feel guilt for the incidents which eventually led to the destruction of Raccoon City. Now, since he had met Elizabeth, Chris was not so sure. 

" Claire, I think we need to know more than what we already do about Elizabeth. I mean, if she really is sorry about creating the T-Virus, something definitely must have happened for her to feel this way about herself and the whole situation. I want to know what. " He thought to himself, I think I want to know more about her for a different reason that I doubt that Claire will like at all. 

Claire had calmed somewhat by now, and she said, " I agree with you. There is something up that is the real reason for all of this. " 

She turned torward the facility and exclaimed, " Hey, isn't that Elizabeth? She's headed back into the lab. Doesn't she know that it's still dangerous in there? " 

Chris looked as well and began to curse. He knew how to deal with zombies, but he suspected that Elizabeth had not even the slightest clue. He ran back to the camp and gathered his shotgun and some ammunition. The others had already noticed Elizabeth's flight torward the infected facility and were ready to follow her in and save her from herself. 

Claire collected her weapon as well, and the group of former S.T.A.R.S. members, a mercenary, and a rookie cop began again to do what they had done before, relieve the world of a few infected zombies. 

Their experience paid off handsomely as little time and ammunition was wasted in their pursuit of the scientist. Claire and Leon split off from the main group, as did Jill and Carlos, leaving Chris and Barry to attempt to find Elizabeth in three possible different directions that she might have gone. Chris and Barry were the first to encounter creatures infected by the T-Virus. 

Chris pulled the trigger on his shotgun, letting loose an explosive spray that decimated the zombies. The zombies moaned and writhed until pools of blood spread from under their bodies. 

Barry held his handgun in a ready position, and he looked further down the hallway that he and Chris had entered. 

" Hey, Chris, where did you find her? Maybe she's gone back there. " Barry's low, thunderous voice echoed in the empty hallway. 

The fluorescent lights flickered a little as Chris tried to remember where the room was. It was hidden somewhere in the floors below him, but he did not know how safe it was. He panicked at that thought. What if she had been...? 

He didn't want to think about it, so he motioned to Barry, " I think she might have gone downstairs. Her lab was down there. I'm pretty sure of it. " 

They explored the hallway carefully, preparing for any surprises. Chris stepped over a newly dead body on the green and white-tiled floor. The body had worn a white labcoat with a metal nametag that read, " Sorensen, Levi. " The torso had been eaten out by one or more of the flesh-eating zombies. They could never be sure after the fact. Chris caught himself sighing, relieved that the body did not belong to Elizabeth. Barry looked at him quizzically, thinking his partner's behavior to be odd in this kind of situation. 

As they reached the elevator to the lower levels of the facility, the doors of the elevator opened to reveal Elizabeth struggling under the grasp of a zombie. She pushed it off again and again, trying to escape. It terrified her and reminded her of the time that the dog had lunged at her. The dog's jaws had come within inches of tearing her skin. She still remembered the way that the dog's teeth flashed in the fluorescent lights like lightning that had struck too close to where she was standing. Elizabeth's eyes were wide with fright, and she looked to Chris and Barry, pleading for their help. 

When the momentary shock wore off, Chris and Barry readied their weapons and prepared to fire. Barry began to curse when it became apparent that he couldn't get a shot at the zombie without hurting the scientist. Chris dropped his shotgun to the ground and grabbed Barry's handgun away from him. His practice with sharp-shooting would come in handy now. He stood still for just a few seconds, long enough to shoot the zombie directly in its head. The blood and brain matter exploded onto the walls and onto Elizabeth, causing her to scream loudly and sending echoes throughout the hall. 

She collapsed against the wall of the elevator as the zombie's body fell between the doors. Elizabeth was noticeably shaken as Chris ran to the elevator to check on her. Barry followed him shortly. Chris helped her up, supporting as her knees buckled when she tried to leave the elevator. 

Chris gripped her shoulders and began to admonish her, " How dare you do something so stupid? You know how dangerous this place is. You made it this way! " 

Elizabeth flinched at his words. He was right, and she began to weep. She had been so scared of her own experiment, yet hadn't she wanted to take responsibility for her actions? She removed a folded piece of paper from her breast pocket on her labcoat. It was tinged with the blood of the zombie, but the message written on it was still legible. 

" Second planned outbreak in MA eminent. Prepare for new data. The Chairman " 


	5. Default Chapter Title

Too Much of Heaven: Chapter Five by Andromache 

All of the characters except Miss Coronado are property of Capcom and their associates. 

Another outbreak of her deadly virus. 

Elizabeth was aware of the zombie's blood drying on her skin and in her hair as she held the bloodied piece of paper up so that Chris could read it. Both stood still, afraid that even breathing would make the words on the paper more real. They appeared to be in their own world as Chris raised his eyes from the paper and locked them with Elizabeth's. His eyes held completely numb terror within their orbs. The stillness was broken when Barry asked if he could read what the paper had written on it. 

Barry held the paper up to his eyes, and when he read the message from the chairman, the color drained from his face. He moaned softly, " No...." 

He turned to Elizabeth, who looked as if she was barely able to stand, and asked, " Is this true? Will it happen all over again? " 

Barry's eyes pled with Elizabeth, imploring her to say that it wasn't true. Their lives were going to be normal from now on, weren't they? This was what they had wanted ever since the mansion outside the Raccoon City had been destroyed. They had just destroyed the main base of operation for Umbrella. Life was going to be fair to them now. They had avenged the dead citizens of Raccon City. Was there any more that they had to do? 

Part of Elizabeth wanted to say that she was lying to them, to say that the world would be alright again, that their work was done, but her conscience held her from saying anything at the moment. The only thing that she could do was nod mutely. Her nod, combined with the tears welling in her eyes, served to make Barry moan again. 

While the enormity of the chairman's message sunk into their psyches, Claire and Leon had come as quickly as they could when they heard Elizabeth's unearthly scream as the zombie attacked her. They passed Jill and Carlos who followed them closely. All four ran through the hallways of the facility, killing the occasional zombie if it happened to be in their way. Breathless, they halted as they saw Chris standing motionless, Barry bent down with his hands on his knees breathing heavily, and Elizabeth standing in front of Chris holding a bloody piece of paper, her eyes reflecting an anguished look. The doors to the elevator were still attempting to close on the body of the zombie lying between them. Blood soaked the walls inside the elevator, and they assumed that the blood on Elizabeth belonged formerly to that zombie. 

Carlos broke the silence by asking, " What's wrong? Elizabeth, are you okay? " 

His words shook Elizabeth from her reverie, and she answered, " I'm fine, but there is something terribly wrong. I received this fax from the chairman, and he says to prepare for the second outbreak in Massachusetts. Raccoon City is going to happen all over again. " 

A collective gasp arose from the four. Jill swallowed bile rising from her stomach and asked, " Are you sure? " 

" Yes, I am. " 

Shock was overcome by a sick realization that their mission wasn't over yet. Carlos appeared dejected, looking down at his boots and the barrel of his automatic rifle. He had been tempted by Umbrella's promises and found out that they were not the saints that they had made themselves out to be. They were not interested in saving citizens of Third World countries from abject poverty but were interested in using them as a cheap source of expendable workers. How could they be stopped if they hadn't been able to stop them so far? 

Leon cursed loudly, pacing back and forth. He brought up his arms in frustration. After only being a cop of the Raccoon City police department for one single day, he still felt loyalty for the men that had fought the zombies to no avail and wanted to make sure that their deaths were not in vain. The deaths would be if he did not honor them by removing the bestial corporation that had engineered them. 

Jill stood still like Chris, but there was a cold look in her eyes that belied the fiery anger that she felt. It was a dangerous kind of anger, that which can result in the slow, torturous end of the recipient. There was almost no need to articulate that anger, but she spoke anyway. 

" Then there is more for us to do. We can't give up now, no matter how much we would like to. " 

Claire looked heartbroken. Jill's words made sense, but after the effort that they had put into stopping Umbrella up to this point was nearly negated by this message. She quelled her despair, put on a brave face, and said, " We can't. You're right, but this is going to happen all over again to a different city, this one is Massachusetts. Raccoon City doesn't have to happen again. We can stop them before the city is ruined. " 

Elizabeth said softly, almost imperceptibly, " Of course, there will be some deaths, but I think I can do something this time. Maybe even stop my virus in its tracks. " 

Leon retorted angrily, his eyes flashing, " How do you propose to do that? This virus is a devastator of life, a veritable Shiva, and you say that it can be stopped? One small town in America was just blown out of existence by your virus, and you want to believe that Death can be halted? " 

Recoiling from his anger, Elizabeth persevered, " Yes. It can be stopped. I know it can. " 

" Leon, I was infected with the virus in Raccoon City by the Nemesis, and Carlos found the vaccine in the hospital. He brought it back to me, and I survived. If the vaccine existed, then there must be a way to spread it out over a massive scale, enough to cure the city, " Jill interjected. 

Elizabeth nodded, " There need only be some adjustments made to it. Viruses mutate constantly, and we need a vaccine that can do the same, maybe even at a faster rate. I need time though, and I don't know how much we have until the second outbreak. I'll start as soon as I can. I'll need a sample of your blood, Jill, so that I can see the latest incarnation of the virus. " 

Jill replied, " I can do that. One more question though. How are we going to spread it on such a large scale? I mean, we can't run around injecting any zombie we find. There's going to be too many of them for us to do that. " 

That was a terrifying thought. How would she do that? Could it be air-borne and spread by the intake of air? The virus spread by an infectious bite she knew all too well from her experience of near-infection by the monstrous dog. That still gave her nightmares, but the Tyrant series was even worse. Elizabeth shuddered. 

Chris had recovered enough to enter the conversation at this point while Barry remained in shock. He thought for a moment and said, " We'll find a way. We have to although that could have gone unsaid. What is important, " he spoke, gaining a new perspective, " Is that we don't roll over on our backs and allow them to get away with this. " 

Elizabeth walked away from Chris and stood, gazing toward the elevator. She turned toward the group and said, " That was my problem the first time. I was so intoxicated with the power that they had given me that I stood by and did nothing while they filled the mansion with my hideous children. I was so proud of myself for even bringing them into existence. Unfortunately, even God had to experience the fall of his creation, and so will I. I may not use a flood. I don't have that much power, but I can stop the virus from spreading. 

" I can only hope that I can stop myself. " 


	6. Default Chapter Title

Too Much of Heaven: Chapter Six  
by Andromache  
  
All of the characters belong to Capcom and their associates except for Miss Coronado, who belongs to me. I'm so sorry that it has been so damn long since the last part.  
  
The bright fluorescent lights of the hallway cast a harsh glare on the bloody floor. Elizabeth at last looked confident. She had a new purpose now, and there was a small chance that she could redeem herself for her prior actions.   
  
Images of her past flickered before her mind's eye. She remembered graduating from college and receiving the letter in the mail from Umbrella. The letter was written on high-grade linen paper, and at the bottom was the flourishing signature of the chairman, imploring her to work for them at whatever cost to them.She remembered her first day at Umbrella, shaking hands with the chairman and noticing the inhuman chill of his body. His eyes were icy blue, and they pierced her very soul, telling her that her essence was no longer her own. She would gain the world and maybe even touch Heaven from this deal with this unknown devil. Something had made her shiver at that moment, but she did not know what.  
  
She began her work diligently. Working long hours into the night, Elizabeth had grown addicted to coffee and to the virus' nuances. She had been so proud when she was finally able to induce hunger and sleeplessness in the lab rats. Certainly with the lack of sleep combined with the slowing of the synapses of brain cells and the cannibalistic hunger made for a new kind of weapon whose true danger was untested. The tests on the homeless men was on such a small scale that every action was able to be controlled by her, lending her a sense of empowerment that was foreign to every one by despots, tyrants, and scientists. Unfortunately, she never felt the paranoia that plagues tyrants and so continued even when she was in danger because she believed for a time that nothing could harm her. The incident of the near-dog bite had certainly frightened her for a moment, but she brushed it off, claiming that she would never be hurt by her creations.   
  
When the experiments that led to the creation of the Tyrant series began, she delegated them to her underlings who were surprisingly more bloodthirsty than she was. Elizabeth supervised their every move, fearing that one flase step would ruin her reputation as Umbrella's darling and send her out of favor with the chairman. When she was pleased with the result of their work, she grudgingly approved it to be seen by the chairman. The chairman was also pleased with the Tyrant and squeezed her shoulder with his chilly hand. He said that she had a bright future.   
  
Every time that she had asked the chairman about the proposed use of her virus, he evaded answering it. If at anytime that he had revealed his goals to her, it may have been when he mumbled something about decimation and she becoming an angel of no mercy, whatever that had meant to him.   
  
Then the day came that she found out that William Birkin was working on an improvement of her virus. Angrily, she ordered that he was to be killed and samples of the virus were to be returned to her for evaluation. Elizabeth had already begun to crave the approval of the chairman as the other scientists did, and anything that would detract from her work had to be stopped at any cost. Indirectly, she had caused the second, fatal outbreak of Raccon City, but she had not seen the real effect of her virus until the news stations had carried stories about the destruction of the city. Elizabeth inquired as to what had happened and was sickened by the reports of the melee between the hopeless police force and her nefarious creations.   
  
At first, she felt that way because she had let her control over the project slip, as the news reports trickled in, Elizabeth saw that her virus truly was a destroyer. Nothing survived, soon to include the corporation. Maybe even her.  
  
Now, after her reverie, she looked at the reactions of the group in the hallway. Jill stood in front of her with a vicious look in her eyes. The rest looked ill. Elizabeth decided to rectify that.  
  
" My virus is not unstoppable. I know that because I believe in a balance. What is evil will be countered by that which is good. All of you are good, and I hold the key to that which is evil. Our only enemy is time. "  
  
" Can we defeat time then ? " Leon asked.  
  
She stared into his eyes with her own reddish brown ones and replied in a commanding tone, " We'll have to, won't we? " 


End file.
